Avoiding a Post-divorce Crisis

It is too late to analyze who’s guilty or what’s happened.
You’re divorced. It’s not the time to cry -- you should begin
your new life.

Going through a divorce is never easy, of course. For a woman, it’s
a crisis involving her life and her relationships. But every crisis is
not just an ordeal, but also a chance to grow as we change because of
the difficulties. Remember that when old relationships come to an end,
new ones appear. To be open to them, it’s necessary to concentrate
on the problems. What’s important is not what you have endured;
the main thing is that you are ready for your best life. You’re
not a lonely and abandoned woman; you are free.

Burning bridges.

Of course, after a divorce you may think that your ex-husband will return
again and you live with vain hope and change nothing in your life. Or,
in the other extreme, you curse your ex-husband, blame him for your ruined
life and again live in the past. Don’t waste your energy on useless
hopes and curses. The divorce is no one’s fault – it’s
life and, as a result, you have acquired experience and knowledge, even
if they came at a price. In fact, now you have even more chances to have
a happy family, though you shouldn’t move too fast. First, you should
come to your senses, accept your new role and learn to like yourself.
What about the ‘ex?’ He was, of course, a part of your life
for a long time; he taught you much and then went his way. Let him go.
The lesson is over.

Sometimes it happens that the ex-husband thinks that he still matters,
even after the divorce. He continues troubling you and complaining. As
they say, ‘divorced but not dispersed.’ It’s important
to end the psychological dependence at once. In this case, the slower
and more gradually you do it, the more painful it is for him.

Set the limits right away -- you are strangers now, or, at least, not
very close acquaintances.

Maintain your own interests, earn your own money and become a more independent
woman.

It is very important to be apart, not to live together after the divorce,
struggling through the remains of a past relationship.

A period of adjustment after a divorce requires a great investment of
emotions. Stop shuffling your feet and take a step forward, stepping out
on the road called ‘New Life.’

Free yourself from the burdens of the past.

Of course, the best years of your life were spent in the marriage; there
were good times and bad. Don’t deny it. It’s all part of you.
Say “thank you” to your old life for everything it has taught
you.

Be cool.

No matter how badly you feel, or in what stressful condition you find
yourself, make decisions with a sober mind. A divorce can suck the lifeblood
out of you. It’s a wound that takes a long time to heal. First,
adapt to a new way of life and then decide what to do. If you don’t
pull yourself together, you may make a mess of things.

A memorable prize.

Imagine what a monument to your marriage will look like. You can build
it from the main components of your life together. The main thing is that
there must be some attractive, funny and absurd elements. For instance,
imagine a bookshelf with lots of dusty volumes. They make up the story
of your marriage. A book that is sitting on this shelf says to you, ’Do
you want me to tell you a new fairy-tale?’

The feeling of expectancy.

After you have said good-bye to your past, it’s time to look around.
But don’t hurry. Psychologists recommend waiting for a year after
the divorce before you begin another serious relationship. When you choose
a new partner, you mustn’t let anxiety, fear or the new woman you’ve
become get in the way. Now is the time:

to take care of yourself. You need this year in order to learn the
lessons from the previous relationship;

to understand what you want;

to radically change your imagination;

to rest and to enjoy yourself;

to profit by your new role in life;

to learn new things.

Don’t do that!

A typical mistake that women make during the period after the divorce
is that they start to pity themselves. Probably, every one of us has experienced
such a feeling. Children, when being punished, (completely undeservedly,
in their minds) often think, “When I die, you’ll be sorry,”
and imagine their parents sobbing. The same mechanism works when you are
a grown-up, only with children, there is the hope that the parents will